


The World on Your Shoulders

by BeesKnees



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-11
Updated: 2014-01-30
Packaged: 2018-01-08 08:53:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1130658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeesKnees/pseuds/BeesKnees
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If this was a good world, Finnick Odair and Annie Cresta would have too many golden and sunkissed children. But this isn't a good world, so Johanna Mason finds herself pregnant with Finnick Odair's daughter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

If this was a good world, Finnick Odair and Annie Cresta would have something like five children, who are all golden and sunkissed. They would live mostly in the sea and rise out of the foam with wave-wild, salt encrusted hair. They would laugh and be free; Finnick would teach them how to fish and take them swimming, and Annie would show them how to twist sea glass into beautiful jewelry and tell them all the myths of the sea. Their home would be too small. The roof would leak, but they would be safe from the snapping grasp of the Capitol. 

But this isn’t a good world. This isn’t a decent world. It’s not even a terrible world. It’s a living hell, an utter nightmare, which is why Johanna Mason finds herself pregnant with Finnick Odair’s daughter a year after she wins her Hunger Games.

 

Later on, the history books will say that Johanna never agreed to whore herself out for Snow. That’s not how it goes. She tries, the same as they all do, in the beginning. She thinks of her four brothers back in District Seven, of her her mother. Of her dogs, even. 

She lies on her back and spreads her legs. And that’s mostly how she meets Finnick Odair. She knows who Finnick Odair is, because who doesn’t? One of the youngest victors to emerge from the arena. (She thinks about that after the first time that she meets him, that he went into the arena years younger than she was when she won.) Most expensive gift in the arena. His games made the most money of all time, she’s been told. (She’s been told that her games made the second most.) 

Clients like to bookend them. Charming and polished Finnick Odair against the raw and wild Johanna Mason. It helps her and destroys her the first few times when they’re together. (He shows her that she can’t just lie back and spread her legs. It’s still a show, and there’s no one better than Finnick Odair. He’s the world best and most expensive prostitute, all easy-going smiles and gentle touches. His hands are always snug against someone’s lower back, lips always brushing against the shell of someone’s ear.) She wants to hate him. She does hate him. She does hate Finnick Odair.

(And it’s not that simple, because he covers for her for a long time, eases all the attention back onto himself when they work together. This boy has taken beatings for her, and has taken fuckings for her that are terrifying. He does these things for her even though he doesn’t owe her a goddamn thing, and she hates him for it, because she doesn’t need anyone to protect her. She is Johanna Mason. She won her Hunger Games at the end of an axe without a single fucking sponsor and she doesn’t need anyone’s protection, least of all golden boy Finnick Odair.)

She doesn’t have allies.

That sentiment counts for so little. 

It counts for nothing at all the night she finally loses it, three months in. (He’s been doing this for five years, if the rumors are to be believed.) It’s Finnick who catches her about the waist when she goes to finally kill one of their clients; it’s not even that he’s asked anything more than what they’ve done before, but Johanna suddenly can’t take an entire lifetime of this. She doesn’t have any weapon, but she starts after him anyway. She’s barely made it three steps before Finnick’s strong arms are around her, deftly catching her. (She, just like everyone else, forgets what he is, how he’s been trained.) He shoves her out into the hallway, clicks the door shut behind him. 

She screams. She screams because she can’t swallow the sound anymore. She screams until she’s raw, and her stylist team takes her back to the apartment that has been given to her in the Capitol. She trashes it. She throws the chairs against the walls, listening for the crack of the plastic-made fake wood. She breaks all the glasses and then the plates and then the television, and finally she has nothing left. 

Finnick shows up at seven in the morning, and she wonders if someone has seen him like this. She doesn’t know where his own stylist team is, but he’s bleeding, and there are bruises around his throat, and she’s fairly sure he’s concussed. (She thinks that means he’s not supposed to go to sleep, but he waves her off, collapses on the ruins of her couch. Doesn’t say anything about the mess of her apartment.)

“I don’t owe you anything,” she snarls. 

He smiles, still bleeding charisma, and falls asleep.

Her eldest brother dies the next day. Her second brother the week after. Finnick surfaces and drinks at her apartment, and they poignantly don’t talk about the bodies stacking up in District Seven, about the funerals she will never go to, about the good-byes that will always stick in her throat. (They are Finnick Odair and Johanna Mason, bookends to each other, except that she no longer spreads her legs for President Snow.)

Six months after she wins the Hunger Games, she has no family left. There is no one left alive she loves. Finnick is suddenly the person who knows her best in the world. 

They sleep together, without another person in between them, for the first time, on the morning her mother is buried in District Seven. 

Snow has no more leverage over her, she thinks. She breathes. 

She was so fucking wrong, so fucking stupid, that it hurts later on.

 

She finds out as she’s getting ready to go on her Victory Tour. She has no one left to keep alive, but there’s still no getting out of this. No one expects her to smile and be gracious though. That’s not who she is, and that’s not the persona the Capitol expects from her. 

Her stylists are in the room, painting her nails of all things, when the doctor — the one she used to see regularly, before she decided to stop playing Snow’s game — comes in and clears his throat. He shifts from one foot to the other, not quite meeting her eye. 

Finally, he manages to say, “You’re pregnant, Miss Mason.”

(And that is fucking impossible, is the first thing she wants to say. Because she explicitly remembers this asshole injecting her with something about a year ago that was supposed to safeguard against this kind of problem, and the only person she’s slept with in six months is Finnick Odair, and she knows they do something to the male victors as well. You don’t get a baby off a victor by accident. And it’s that last sentiment that suddenly sticks her in head. No, you don’t get a baby off a victor by accident.)

“I’ve taken the liberty of notifying Mr. Odair,” the doctor says, and there’s no shifting feet now, just a piercing gaze that pins her in place, says, this baby isn’t going anywhere. 

“Get out,” she manages to say through gritted teeth, needing them all out of her sight immediately. She needs to scream, needs to claw. 

“We can’t,” her stylist says, and Johanna hears the hint of remorse in her voice. She wants to claw her throat out with the fake nails. She is Johanna Mason, and she isn’t weak.  
Ten minutes later and a bouquet of white roses arrives from the president’s mansion with a short note of congratulations. 

The lights of Flickerman’s studio are sweltering. Johanna doesn’t remember them being like this. She swears that the applause is louder when she walks out this time than it was after she won her Games. 

Her dress is binding, all dark browns and greens, tight against her skin, as if to show how very not-pregnant she looks at the moment. The heels are too tall for her, but she walks steadily in them. (She thinks, I couldn’t run in these. If I needed to get away, there would be nothing I can do. There is nothing I can do, but I bet these spikes would make a good weapon.) She imagines sinking a heel into Flickerman’s shoulder. Imagines the surprise that would cause. 

She sits down in the chair waiting for her. She doesn’t lean back. Her body language is too terse, her shoulders too angular. She doesn’t smile at Flickerman. He has a lifetime of training the crowd, but she never helps him, always makes him work for it. She knows what’s coming, and so does the audience. She doesn’t rise to any of his jokes, gives singular syllable answers to all of his questions about her tour, about her talent, about what she enjoys in the Capitol. 

“So, Johanna,” Caesar says, smiling growing wider, telling her that she can sulk all she wants, but he’s got all the cards. He’s got the question everyone wants an answer to. He puts his hand on her knee and she stares at it until he takes it away. “I think we are all quite _interested_ in knowing when you’re due.” 

“Due?”

There is acid in her throat, and she thinks, I’m not doing this. What else do they think they can do to me? What else could be fucking worse than this?

She never does find out if it was Snow’s or Finnick’s idea for Finnick to appear on stage in the very second when Johanna is about to murder Flickerman, but there he is all the same. He peers around the edge of the stage, and the entire crowd just goes wild, absolutely loses it. (She will never be applauded for like that in her entire life, and she is so insanely grateful for it.)

Caesar bounds up to meet Finnick, grabs his hand, and begins to pump it up and down several times, talking energetically to Finnick without the microphone overhearing them. 

There are only two chair on stage, so Finnick merely leans on the arm of Johanna’s, one of his long arms going around the back. He’s too close, and Johanna thinks that she might just settle for killing him. 

“Finnick!” Caesar says exuberantly once he’s also back in his seat. He’s beaming now, clearly pleased to have someone of his caliber on stage. 

“We were just discussing the exciting news,” Caesar presses. “Anything you’d care to share with us?”

“Share with you?” Finnick asks, laughing. “More like anything you want to share with me? You know, I was in Four, out on my boat, and this poor man comes swimming up along the side. Had these purple ringlets that were just plastered against his head. Anyway, he goes, ‘You’re Finnick Odair, right?’ And I nod, because that’s who I am.” He pauses to grin, and Caesar laughs along with him. “And this man says, ‘Well, I’ve got a message from Johanna Mason from you,’ and tells me, right there in the water, while he’s still trying to stay afloat!”

The whole thing is such a blatant lie that Johanna can’t believe there’s a single person in the Capitol who believes it. But the crowd loves it. They eat it up, laugh along with Finnick, practically forget that she’s there on stage at all. 

“You must be excited!” Caesar exclaims.

“Of course we are,” Finnick returns. His fingers actually brush over her shoulders. She doesn’t need to imagine what they would sound like if she broke three of them. She’s heard that before. 

She knows she should smile. And that’s precisely why she doesn’t.

Caesar asks Finnick a few more questions, and these he manages deftly deflect, because they are things he can’t possibly know, things that are far too early to tell. (Sex? Names? Where the baby will be raised? Will they get married?) 

The answer to the last one is a resounding no, and Finnick manages to imply that with a simple smile. The Capitol would never give up Finnick Odair to Johanna Mason.

The moment they are off stage, Johanna vomits, all acid. When Finnick reaches for her, she does break two of his fingers, and she thinks, close enough.

He doesn’t cry out or even flinch, just lets his hand fall to his side. She stares at him, venom in her gaze, and watches as he ages 10 years from the carefree boy he was on stage. 

“Jo,” he pleads.

“Don’t you ever fucking call me that again,” she snaps instantly. 

“I’m sorry,” he says as she storms away from him. He’s defeated.


	2. Chapter 2

It turns out that these are her options for where the baby can be born:

District Seven. She can go home. Or where her home once was. She can have her daughter there. Raise her there. Let her roam the forests and sleep under the stars, and have no protection from the Games at all.

District Four. A strange place that Johanna has only seen fleetingly, full of Finnick’s sisters and his nieces and nephews and cousins, and all the family a child could want. She could be raised as a Career. She could be prepared for the Games. She could be as glorious as her father is.

The Capitol. She can be born in this hellhole. This nest of decadence and lies and vanity and greed. She can learn that her beauty is never good enough, that her mother and father are only playthings to be maneuvered around by the president. She can be famous for everything she ever does, her first words documented, her first steps recorded. She can never have to worry about being reaped — in fact, she can be a sponsor. She can be a hateful and greedy god playing with her other peoples’ lives. She can celebrate the deaths of the tributes. 

Johanna dreads the swell of her stomach, the kicking of the girl inside of her.

 

It has been fourteen months since she won her Hunger Games. She is four months pregnant with Finnick Odair’s daughter. She meets Annie Cresta. 

Fuck.

 

Johanna thought that she knew Finnick better than everyone else. (He’s not a friend, because Johanna doesn’t have friends.) But she thought they had an understanding in the tearing arena that is the Capitol. She thought that Finnick dropped his mask when he was with her, and wasn’t the charming Casanova any longer. 

(It’s stupid, now, to think that way, because she knows that she doesn’t drop her mask entirely around him. She’s a little less on edge, a little less raw, but that doesn’t mean she’s any less dangerous, that she’s anything less caustic. And she realizes that he’s the same. They peel off parts of themselves, but maybe neither of them even really know who they are at the bottom anymore. Maybe they’re just shells, hollowed at the center.)

He’s different with Annie though, even though there’s something careful and measured about how they act around each other. (It’s because she’s there.) 

But it doesn’t matter, and she suddenly knows everything about Finnick. She sees why he smiles in the Capitol, and why he doesn’t bother trying to break necks and tear into people with knives, like she would have in the end. She sees the way he holds his body differently when he’s on the sand of Four, and how Annie and Finnick don’t dare to hold hands on the beach, but their hands are turned toward each other anyway, and it’s like the whole world doesn’t exist, because it’s just the two of them.

She’s taken something away from them. She’s the space in between their hands, her and the Capitol, all damaging air and noise. (And she’s angry with Finnick all over again, the fucking idiot, because they could take care of this. They could just —)

Johanna isn’t scared of anything, but she is scared of Annie Cresta at first. (She can give into a certain type of madness, she thinks, but the idea of it claiming her is terrifying. There’s a lack of control there that gets under Johanna’s skin, that makes her feel like she needs to claw away from it.) But Annie isn’t what she’s expecting at all, certainly not the world-worn, shaking girl who came through District Seven precious days before Johanna was reaped herself. 

Their first night in District Four, Johanna overhears Finnick crying, overhears Annie comforting him. She has to get away, so she does. She just walks out of the house, out onto the beach, straight into the surf. The sea is endless here, and it makes her miss the trees, the way they stood all around you, encompassed you. You could never tell where you were, just felt the brush of pine, felt the motion of birds. There was so much safety there. And she figures that’s what the sea is for Annie and Finnick, and she thinks that the sea isn’t a bad second home as second homes go. 

If there’s a world where homes still exist.

She blames the sand when she doesn’t hear Annie slip up beside her, wrap a heavy blanket around her shoulders. Johanna starts badly, and hates herself for the moment of weakness, even if there’s not really anyone around to see it. It still exists anyway. 

“They say if you cry seven tears into the sea, a selkie will come to you,” Annie says, voice light as they stare out into the consuming darkness. It’s difficult to tell where the horizon is. There’s just cresting darknesses, and then the cold sensation of the water rolling against her feet, tugging at her. 

“Selkie?” Johanna answers blandly before she can stop herself; she’s too tired to be angry. 

“Sea shapeshifters,” Annie continues easily. “Humans would steal their skin to keep them on land. Usually marry them.” 

(The idea of home only exists in good worlds. This is not a good world.)

“Would they die?” Johanna asks.

“No,” Annie says, shakes her hair, and Johanna can see her weather-wild hair going all over the place, tendrils of curls that have a life of their own. “Usually their children would set them free again by accident.” 

 

She can’t be in the house for too long. Finnick’s family is so fucking perfect that sometimes she wants to be crass and mean just to be the odd one out even more than she is. 

Because they’re perfect when they have no fucking right to be. Most of them are overprotective of Finnick. (His oldest sister sees more than the rest, she can tell. There’s something of a kinship there, because she doesn’t hug Finnick as tightly as the rest of them, and she doesn’t smile readily at Johanna. It’s like she’s the only one who can sense the blood in the water, and doesn’t choose to ignore it.) The youngest sister is only 16, can still be reaped. 

They all look at her out of the corners of their eyes, as if trying to sort out just what she’s doing in their home. How it is she came to be pregnant with Finnick’s baby, because they all adore Annie so much. 

(It’s so obvious, Johanna thinks. Now, it’s so obvious. It was always going to be Annie and Finnick. She wants to ask if it was before or after Annie’s Games, but that will be a story she will never hear, the same way that she and Finnick will never tell any of the sisters that the first time she met Finnick, he was bound with gold ropes to a Gamemaker’s headboard. They’ll never tell them how when they fuck, it’s rough, and Johanna bites Finnick until she draws blood, because she knows the boy can take it. She knows he likes to actually feel something every now and then.) 

Finnick’s father stays away from them as much as he can, taking to wandering the upper half of the house like a ghost. It’s not a surprise that he doesn’t take much interest in the prospect of a grandchild, because he he has made a study of ignoring he still has a son. 

This is all better than being in the Capitol, she reminds herself. Still too many eyes. But at least she’s not being made to dance on Flickerman’s show. 

She and Finnick still skirt around each other, because any time they’re in the same room for too long she thinks about hitting him in the mouth. 

Surprisingly, or not, she spends most of the time on the beach, and Annie follows her the most. She brings dinner there, brings her blankets, and makes fires, and Johanna accepts it all, because there’s no point in refusing any longer. They don’t talk much — Annie tells her stories of the sea sometimes. 

And every so often, just when the sun is beginning to set, and it’s just the roar of the waves in front of them, their daughter will begin to kick. She doesn’t know what the hell possesses her to do this, but she invites Annie to feel the growing swell of her stomach. Annie’s touch is feather-light.

“She’s swimming,” Annie breathes, and she starts to cry. “She’s swimming.”

Johanna cries, too, for the first time in six years. 

 

Mags meets them as they get on the train. She wraps her arms tightly around Finnick, strokes her barely-still hands through his golden hair. It doesn’t seem to matter that she can hardly speak. There are no words needed to convey the depth of the relationship between the two of them.

(There are fleeting moments when Johanna is jealous of what Finnick has — what he has with Annie, what he has with Mags — and then she remembers the price Finnick pays for having these things.)

She stays on the sidelines, waiting to get on the train. 

Mags looks at her as Finnick pulls away, points one gnarled finger at her, and Johanna understands: Take care of each other. Johanna lifts her chin just slightly, not enough to be called a nod. 

Their entourage on the train is probably the smallest either of them has ever had. It means that Johanna and Finnick end up in the main compartment of the train alone, without warning. She is on one couch, and he’s on the other. His face is turned toward the window, one arm across the back of the couch, legs a messy sprawl. She understands why people forget he’s mortal. Why they think he’s an Atlas. 

He looks at her, and she doesn’t dare look away.

“Jo,” he says quietly. (Sometimes, he would say her name like that in the morning, stolen moments after the frantic rush of sex, but before he would have to be out the door again, back to his team to be remade, back out into the streets.)

She doesn’t rebuff him this time, just watches him warily. 

He leans across the small space, takes up one of her hands. 

“You know you’re my best friend,” he tells her, head down for a moment; it sounds practiced enough to sound natural. That’s Finnick Odair.

“Shut the fuck up, Odair,” Johanna snaps. “We don’t have the luxury for such innocence.” 

There would never be love between the two of them. Even if this was a good world. That’s not who they are. They are distractions. They are bandages, crutches, they keep the other from falling apart — but they don’t heal each other. 

“We’ll survive this,” she finally says, giving him the words; this is what he already knows though, because she is Johanna Mason and he is Finnick Odair, and they didn’t win their Games by deciding to let the Capitol consume them. They won their Games by deciding they could be just as ruthless. 

 

They arrive in District Seven just before dawn, the sun just starting to streak through the spattering of stars overhead. 

It has been fifteen months since she won her Hunger Games. She is five months pregnant with Finnick Odair’s daughter.

There is no one waiting at the train station for her. 

 

They spend most of the first day with the camera crew who came with them from the Capitol. Finnick does all the talking, and Johanna lets him — same as they did in Four. There will be some kind of television special stitched together later, and Johanna is forced to grit her teeth and ignore them. It’s only a day in exchange for all this time in Four and Seven. These are the devil’s deals they make with Snow.

Their reception in Seven is nothing like their reception in Four. People recognize her, but their smiles are wary. In Four, Finnick has fooled them into thinking that he doesn’t bring the Capitol in. In Seven, they know better. They’re not Careers out here. They don’t worship victors. They know something bad happened to the Mason family because Johanna came home with a crown. 

Her house is the same. Except that it is empty. There’s a layer of dust. Everything else is untouched, as if everyone in the town was afraid to come up and take away what’s there, even though she knows that plenty of these things are needed. 

Johanna lights a fire in the grate, and Finnick ends up going into town to get food so they can eat. He cooks too, and up shivers because he isn’t used to the cold, and they make his clothes so thin. She finds a few of her brothers’ clothes for him, and it’s strange to see him walking around in a flannel shirt, heavy overcoat, and a thick pair of denim pants. He falls asleep on the couch, body curled into the side, and Johanna watches him, and then goes back outside.

The cold air is bracing. It cuts into her, and she remembers how much she missed this, how clean the air feels as it seeps into her lungs. She breathes out puffs of white. She pulls her heavy jacket more tightly around her and walks out into the night. (This is what she used to be; this is the collision of past and present, the Johanna Mason who wore heavy, oversized clothes that were not refined, but safe. This is the Johanna Mason who had dirt under her nails and only ever used an axe to chop firewood.) 

She feels her way through the dark, murmurs constellations that she remembers. They don’t see stars in the Capitol. Too much light pollution. 

She smells pine and feels the mud sink in underneath her shoes. She walks without thinking and it’s not a surprise when she ends up in the graveyard that holds the Mason family — practically doubled in size since she’s last been here. 

She lets her fingertips linger across each headstone — the best the Capitol could buy, no doubt. She traces letters, doesn’t let her mind put them together. Her brothers in a neat row, her mother at the head. (If she had known this was the price she was going to pay, would she have dropped her guard, let an axe into her own stomach? Would 14-year-old Finnick refrained from volunteering, kept quiet on the sands of Four, resigned himself to cowardice and a lifetime of fishing? You don’t speculate about these things when you a Victor, because it is that speculation that will destroy them. They don’t chose death, and that’s their only guiding principle.)

They don’t chose death.

Johanna sinks down on the mound of dirt, curls up against her mother in a way she never did, not even as a child. She watches the cold exhale of her breath, finds the constellation for the hunter, and falls asleep more soundly than she did the entire time she was in Four. 

She wakes up at dawn to the sensation of Finnick picking her up. He’s cursing under his breath in a tired and frustrated way. 

“Goddammit, Jo,” Finnick says, doesn’t even struggle under her additional weight as he starts back toward the house. 

She tries to say, don’t call me that anymore, but instead she lets herself drift closer to sleep again. He gets them back without any problem, slips her into the oversized bed even though she’s covered in dirt and leaves. He slides in beside her, and she sticks her blue-tinged hands underneath the shirt he’s wearing. (What a novel moment.) His skin is warm, sunshine-laced as always, and he doesn’t bother shivering when she begins to trace his ribs; there’s an erased scar there from where he caught a knife down the side of his torso his fourth day in. The closest he came to dying. 

“Not here,” Johanna says finally, the words murmured into the lost hours between night and dawn. 

“Okay,” is all Finnick says in response.


	3. Chapter 3

It has been nineteen months since Johanna won her Hunger Games. She is nine months pregnant with Finnick Odair’s daughter, and there is a crowd waiting for her at the main hospital in the Capitol. Finnick is already there, smiling and sacrificing himself in front of the cameras again.

Johanna is on a train to Four. 

Mags and Finnick’s sisters are waiting for her when she arrives, quickly herd her off the train. They don’t take her back to the house that Finnick claimed when he was 14, but to the small home that Finnick and all of his sisters were born in, the one down the road from Annie Cresta’s former home. 

The fire makes the room boiling hot and Johanna refuses to lie in the bed, but paces the room as the contractions shake her body from the inside out. She twists at Annie’s hand, and listens to the stories that Annie’s tells her — ones that are not of the sea this time, but all the creatures that wandered the woods, sprites that came out of pine tree knotholes, and animals with patterns of speech.

She doesn’t let herself shout, just grits her teeth. This is not the painful part. It’s always what comes after that is worse. (She hates these moments when her body betrays her though. She’s watched herself be transformed during this pregnancy, caught equally between wonder and horror. There is this thing inside of her, this creature, practically a parasite, pushing her organs into strange configurations. But she is simultaneously a living thing, the only thing that Johanna has ever managed to keep alive. It’s inspiring. It’s terrifying. Their daughter is a sacrifice.)

The day fades into late afternoon and by now the Capitol must have realized that Johanna has slipped away. She has stolen this moment from them. She tells herself that she can’t think about what’s being done to Finnick. She listens to Annie’s voice. Breathes when Mags tell her to breathe. Pushes when Mags tells her to push. She gives birth to her daughter with the sound of the sea in the background just as the first stars come out. 

She is not even nineteen years old yet. 

Johanna sinks into the bed only then, lets the exhaustion begin to feverishly grip at her bones. She rests her head against the wall, listens to the motion of everyone around her. Finnick’s sisters fuss over the baby, who is crying loudly with perfectly formed lungs.

Eventually, Mags herds them all out. It’s just Annie and Johanna and the baby then. The baby isn’t crying anymore, and Annie is humming quietly to her; Johanna can hear the creak of the floor underneath Annie’s bare feet as she pads around the room. Annie sits down on the edge of the bed, and Johanna understands that the implicit expectation: she should hold her daughter. She should want to hold her daughter. But she doesn’t. She can’t even bring herself to look at her, so Annie holds her her hand until she falls asleep.

 

She wakes up reflexively in the middle of the night, because she hears someone moving around in the next room. That’s another thing that never leaves you — that instinctive panic when being roused from sleep. After dehydration, sleep was the second greatest enemy in the arena. Defenses down. Senses disorientated. Even now, it takes Johanna an extra instant to realize that she’s in District Four. Annie is asleep in bed beside her, smelling of cinnamon and sea salt. 

Johanna eases her body out of bed, ignores all the twinges of pain and discomfort that rack through her. The crib is pushed close to the bed, and reflexively, Johanna can’t help but look down. She’s rooted to the spot, pinned in place by the girl who is still fast asleep there. She’s so small, too small, and Johanna feels her knees go weak. She feels like she’s going to collapse entirely. For the first time in a very long time, she lets herself feel entirely terrified. It’s a sensation that grips at the back of the throat, nearly sweeps her away. She thinks of Finnick in the Capitol, probably bleeding on somebody’s floor — probably Snow’s — and she thinks, fuck, what have we’ve done? Her fingers clutch at the edge of the crib, knuckles white.

They’ve done a terrible thing, bringing in something so vulnerable, so defenseless, into this world. Her hair is dark like Johanna’s, none of Finnick’s sunshine gleam. But her hair is thick, curling just a little, like Finnick’s sometimes does when it gets too long. And implicitly, Johanna knows that this little girl is going to have Finnick’s ocean blue eyes. She’ll have a bit of the sea in her, too; she’s a daughter of Four and Seven. She’s a daughter of Victors. 

“What’s her name?” Annie asks sleepily from where she’s still curled up in bed; not “You should name her.” The sentiment is true though. Unbidden, she remembers her mother talking about how it was bad luck for infants to not be named immediately.

“Wren,” Johanna answers. 

“The bird that outsmarted the eagle,” Annie murmurs.

 

She gets two days. Two days to force her body back into familiar shapes, to reacquaint herself with her own skin. She is good at pushing pain down, and so this part is not so hard.

It’s all the other parts that are hard. It’s holding Wren when she cries, knowing that every moment is meaningless. It’s wanting to give her away immediately, because there’s no sense in forming attachments, and it’s wanting to be near her for every minute she can steal. It’s hours of sleeplessness, of watching Annie and Finnick’s sisters sing lullabies of the sea to her. Watching her move and breathe, and be utterly perfect. Watching as they carry her down to the sea, dab salt water on both of her feet and formally name her. It’s taking her out amongst the few trees that are spattered across Four. 

It’s giving her up before the train comes. It’s knowing that she doesn’t know when she’ll ever see her again. Might not ever see her again. It’s going back to the Capitol and knowing that hell is waiting to swallow her whole again. 

She gets on the train and is empty. She stares across the way, doesn’t move from her seat the entire time. She listens to the low purr of the engine, and forgets the sound of the ocean and Wren’s laughter. She can’t carry such things with her to the Capitol. (She knows that’s what Finnick does. It destroys him as it sustains him. It’s something to live and die for, and Johanna can’t have either.) 

The flocks are there when she disembarks. Her name is shouted, and Johanna is still stalwart, eyes on a fixed position as she maneuvers her way through the crush of bodies, ignoring the clicks and flashes of cameras. There is a car waiting for her when the sea of people finally parts, and that’s no surprise. She gets into the backseat. She expects to be taken to Snow, and is finally surprised when they pull up in front of Finnick’s apartment instead. She gets out of the car before the driver can come get the door, makes eyes contact until he backs down, and walks in by herself. 

Don’t be dead, she thinks as she gets into the elevator and jabs the button for Finnick’s floor. She doesn’t really think that Snow killed Finnick, but if she walks into the apartment and finds Finnick’s body — that dumb fuck — 

She walks out into the hall, shoulders squared, knocks on the door with the blunt side of her fist, the noise too loud. There’s nothing for a long drag of time, seconds bleeding into minutes, before Johanna pounds more forcefully on the door. It swings open just as she considers kicking the damn thing in. Finnick is standing there. Alive at least, she thinks. His hair is its usual mess, but there’s a dark bruise under one eye, and he’s holding his jaw funny, as if it hurts for him to close his mouth all the way. She stares at him, and he stares right back at her, as if he’s never seen her before. (In her defense, she’s never seen him this visibly marked before. He has the best goddamn stylist team in the world, because they erase bruises and cuts almost instantly. Finnick Odair is always unblemished when he’s seen in public.) 

She pushes inside, because for once in his life, he can’t seem to find words, and she’s not staying in the hall anymore. He closes the door behind her. His apartment is a mess, but that’s not a surprise. She heads straight for his liquor cabinet, because they both need it, and besides, she knows that he has alcohol that is more expensive than what people in 12 make in an entire year. 

She pours them both straight shots of whiskey and turns to hand his to him. He’s limping, too — too obviously, as if he can’t even hide it. He accepts the shot though.

She smiles at him in her grimacing sort of way, clinks the edge of her glass against his, and they both down the drink in a smooth slide. His eyes dart sideways, drawing attention to the corner of the room. A new camera. Ah. Johanna gets it now, why he’s been so mum about to this point. In a strange reversal of their usual roles, she has to take point. 

She pours another shot and does it before leaning in, cupping his face. Her thumb is too close to his bruise. She applies her teeth delicately against his earlobe, teasing the skin. Feels his body shift beneath hers. They rotate so that her mouth is away from the camera. 

“Wren,” she tells him, voice low, more breath than anything else. 

She doesn’t ask if he’s all right, and he returns the favor by not asking either. They put on the charade as long as they can stomach it, and then they just go to bed. It’s the first time they’ve merely slept against each other, and it’s harder to hate Finnick Odair when he looks so vulnerable. 

“I promise I’ll protect you both,” Finnick murmurs quietly before they fall asleep, a vow made regardless of the camera.

“You can’t protect anyone,” Johanna tells him, a blunt truth he’s spent years ignoring. He doesn’t say anything else, and Johanna lets the silence take them.

 

These are Johanna’s options for the price she must pay for keeping her daughter safe: She can either bring Wren to the Hunger Games when she is only a few months old. She and Finnick can be seen in the city with her. They will take pictures with her. They will share her with the Capitol. They will dress her in the garish colors that are in style.

Or Johanna can be Finnick’s bookend again. She can let herself be fucked, let herself play the part of the Victor.  
Weeks after Wren is born, Johanna is on her back again.

She and Finnick are given to each of the Gamemakers in turn. Annie sends them a short letter. She and Mags made a baby blanket for Wren. 

They pay dearly for each moment they keep Wren out of the spotlight, out of the Capitol. They miss her first birthday. (Finnick has never even met her.) They pointedly don’t talk about her, except for when they’re in public. It’s only when they’re being interviewed by Caesar that they discuss her — but in stories that have never happened. Finnick hasn’t been to Four in months, but he has a slew of stories about Wren that are all fabricated, delivered with the usual Odair smile. The Capitol gobbles them up readily. They want Johanna to be too cold to be a good mother, and they want Finnick to be too flighty to be a good father, so that’s why they are. 

They are both mentors for the 74th Games. (It has been 36 months since she won her Hunger Games. Her daughter is 17 months old. She hasn’t seen her in 16 months, three weeks, and five days.) Finnick gets to go home for the Reaping, and it’s the first time that he meets Wren. It’s also the first time that the cameras capture images of their daughter, flood the Capitol with them, and Johanna rages in Seven, unable to do anything. (And yet, yet, she’s so big, and it’s so surreal to think that this was the small life that she carried inside of her, that she gave up to Annie Cresta all the months ago. She’s not an infant anymore, she’s a person, with a dazzling small and a love of the ocean.) They show Finnick carrying her across the sand, and the two of them playing in the low surf. And Johanna hates all of it, because this is just what their life should be, no cameras involved, no strings attached. No Annie pretending she doesn’t exist. No Finnick keeping his distance in the Capitol, killing himself in the slowest way possible. 

The Reaping is nothing special in particular. She can tell just by looking that it’s going to be a Victor from One. Cashmere and Gloss will be so fucking proud, she thinks sourly, as she gets onto the train with her own tributes. She ignores them the best she can. She has no interest in bringing Victors home — she takes a page out of Haymitch Abernathy’s book on that front. It’s kinder for them to die in the arena.

She doesn’t get to see Finnick until after the opening ceremonies, because for some dumb fucking reason, he does try to bring his tributes home. She hasn’t sorted that out about him yet. If he’s really just that stupid and optimistic, or if it has something to do with being a Career, something that being fucked over a thousand surfaces hasn’t knocked out of his brain yet. She doesn’t ask.

Toward the end of the Games, they’re requested by a Gamemaker. Gamemakers are the most exhausting, Johanna finds. Johanna is the most likely to murder them. They honestly believe that Victors owe them something. As if it was their grace and intelligence that allowed a Victor to stumble bloodied, half-dead, and completely insane from the arena. They never view themselves as the torturer, but as the savior. And it’s her bad luck that she arrives before Finnick does and finds herself alone with Plutarch Heavensbee. She’s heard his name before, but they haven’t met until this moment. 

The only good thing about this night is that her stylists haven’t tried to force her into a dress. 

“Miss Mason,” Plutarch says when she walks into the room, smiles as if he’s glad to see her. Her skin still crawls when they look at her. He takes one of her hands gently and leads her across the room to the bar. “I thought…” he says, as he begins to mix something. “You might like something to drink.” 

She accepts it wordlessly, because they don’t expect her to play nice. He guides her to one of the couches. She doesn’t let herself hope that Finnick will be here soon, but she does wonder where he is. 

Plutarch sits next to her, too close. Watches as she takes the first mouthful of the burning concoction he’s made. It has just the kick she needs. 

“I thought we might talk,” Plutarch says after a measured moment in a low voice. Johanna rolls her eyes, because she can’t help herself.

“Not usually considered my forte,” she bites off.

Plutarch smiles, grim yet amused.

“I thought you might have some opinion on Wren’s future,” Plutarch says, and he is looking at her too intensely. Her fingers curl sharply around the edge of the couch — and it’s that precise moment that Finnick practically flies into the room, looking flushed but not flustered. He’s wearing a jacket too tight around his slim waist, his chest bare, smeared with base traces of glitter. His mouth looks like he’s been kissed with bruising force already; maybe it has, but Johanna wouldn’t put it beyond his stylist team to have a trick for how to obtain that look. Finnick smiles wildly when he sees the pair of them, already working at smoothing over whatever damage Johanna’s done.

“Sorry for being late,” he says easily, locks the door behind himself, crosses the room with a few strides until he reaches the alcohol. He pops open a bottle of champagne with easy grace and pours three glasses, ignoring whatever it is they’re already drinking. Finnick downs his instantly, grins dazzlingly before serving the two of them.

“We were discussing your daughter,” Plutarch says as Finnick leans down, and there’s little space between their faces. Johanna watches him, feels her own mouth growing razor thin.

“Oh?” Finnick asks unflinchingly, smile unwavering. (Johanna hates Finnick Odair.)

“How old do they start training Careers in District Four?” Plutarch asks, even though he has to know. 

“Five,” Finnick answers instantly. He stands up, the lean lines of his body on display. Johanna has seen this trick before. Finnick is trying to be distracting, trying to drive the topic of conversation in a different direction with the tilt of his hips. Plutarch’s gaze never leaves Finnick’s face. This is the first time Johanna has ever seen anyone not give Finnick’s body a long glance, eyes wandering down muscled planes and long legs. For some reason, this worries her more than anything than what’s been said so far. 

“Her Games will be very popular,” Plutarch says, words still measured, a simple shrug of his shoulders. He takes a slow sip of his champagne, lets his gaze rivet momentarily toward Johanna. 

Johanna knows this feeling. This sensation of being cornered, of needing to be on guard. There is something happening here that neither of them understand, a killing blow that is about to be delivered, and neither Johanna nor Finnick have anything to safeguard themselves with. This conversation has veered far away from what they’ve normally heard. There have been blind comments about how exciting it will be when Wren is old enough to volunteer, but they are made of ignorance and excitement. 

“In fact,” Plutarch presses when Finnick continues to say nothing, “It’s difficult to say if it would be more popular for her to live or die.”

Johanna turns so quickly that she doesn’t even see the mask on Finnick’s face fall. She’s on Plutarch in a moment, the flat of her palm pressed against his windpipe, both their glasses of champagne clattering to the ground. One of the flutes snaps in half. 

“What do you want?” she snarls. 

Finnick is on her seconds later, looping his arms underneath hers and pulling her back. She comes up hissing and bucking, trying to pull free of Finnick, because he is a goddamn idiot. This fuck is threatening their daughter, and Finnick’s grabbing at her instead, protecting him instead of killing him in cold blood like he deserves. He gets her on her feet, and she pushes hard at him, jabbing at his chest hard enough that he has to stumble back. He actually glowers at her for an instant, an expression of irritation that she so rarely sees on his well-practiced face. They’re both breathing a little too hard, staring the other down. It takes Plutarch clearing his throat for them to refocus on him. 

“You can’t protect her playing the game like this,” Plutarch clarifies, his words with more conviction. Johanna and Finnick both stare at him, and neither of them are moving now. Johanna isn’t attacking; Finnick isn’t placating.

“You need to change the game,” Plutarch presses, leans forward toward both of them.

“What do you want?” Finnick says, echoing Johanna's words. His are delivered with a level of seriousness, no honeyed edge. 

There’s sudden screaming from out on the streets. Johanna feels her body tense, sees Finnick’s shoulders go taught. It’s only Plutarch who understands the noise for what it is. He flicks on the television; it’s the end of the Hunger Games. They both lost their tributes awhile ago and so maybe they haven’t paid as much attention as they should have; it’s been impossible to ignore the rumors of the star-crossed lovers from District 12, or the way that Haymitch is suddenly collecting sponsors. 

Johanna is surprised to see that they’re both alive. She’d expected the boy to bleed out, to there never being a real issue over this whole two-victors rule. But there they are. Just the pair of them, blinking up into sunlight as they’re told only one of them can live. Of course, Johanna thinks savagely. What fool actually believes what the Capitol tells them? She waits for the girl to drive an arrow into the boy’s throat, because the boy is obviously too weak to do anything other than let himself be killed. But then there are berries, and she stares, transfixed, the same as Finnick, the same as Plutarch, as something else changes in front of them.

Johanna feels so off balance that all she wants to do is flee the room. She doesn’t trust Plutarch Heavensbee, and she doesn’t understand what’s happening on the television in front of her. 

Plutarch switches the screen off and the darkness eats at the room, silence pounding on their eardrums.  
“I want you to go back into the arena,” Plutarch says. “Next year’s games will be different.”

Johanna pivots, stares at him. The words don’t make sense for a long time. They buzz around in her head, noise, but no substance. It’s Finnick who is able to react first.

“We can’t be tributes again,” he says, a truth they’ve always held close to heart. (What fool actually believes what the Capitol tells them?)

“Anything can happen during a Quarter Quell,” Plutarch answers.

Johanna feels her blood, too hot in her veins. It seems to congeal in her pulse points, and she thinks that she can’t breathe for a moment. (They all have the nightmares, still. She knows that Finnick does; she’s seen him startling himself out of bad dreams, gasping, fingers clutching for tridents that aren’t there. He’s woken her up as she screams in between gritted teeth, trying to dodge out of the way of axes.) She doesn’t think it’s unfair to say that for most of the Victors, the arena is the defining moment of their lives, and to have to face it again would destroy most of them. 

“If we succeeded, there could be no more games,” Plutarch presses when Finnick and Johanna still fail to say anything. (Plutarch Heavensbee probably doesn’t even know how rare a moment this is, to simultaneously silence both Finnick Odair and Johanna Mason. But maybe he does, Johanna thinks.) “Maybe a better world.”  
He drains his flute of champagne and sets it down on the table beside him. He nods at both of them, gathers his jacket, and then gets up and leaves the hotel room, leaving the two of them stranded in the center of it. He doesn’t touch either of them.


	4. Chapter 4

They are both in District Four for Wren’s second birthday. They head out on the train together; the last time they were even on the train together was when Johanna was pregnant with Wren. The rebellion sits on the train with them, although they can’t discuss it. In a way, they’re both heading to Four to say good-bye. Those words won’t ever leave their lips, but they could die or they could fail. 

(Johanna doesn’t know how this trip was wrangled for both of them. She doesn’t ask. Payment will come one way or another.)

She thinks of a thousand lifetimes ago when Finnick told her that she was his best friend. The words still sound childish to her, a desperate plea, but she reaches down and takes Finnick’s hand. Holds tight to it as they slide across the districts.

When they arrive, all of the Odairs are at the train station waiting. Wren is with Annie, hiding behind her legs, hands clutching at Annie’s skirts. Annie has one slim hand rested on Wren’s head. It’s a strange image. (One that Johanna will carry back with her.) She doesn’t know the little girl standing in front of her; the Capitol took her away.

Finnick descends on her immediately though, picking her up and tossing her high into the air. Wren laughs, grabs at Finnick’s face, and the entire time they’re there, begs for him to throw her. 

They head down to the beach, have dinner and a bonfire there. Johanna remains by Mags’ side, planted in the sand as she watches Finnick chase their daughter, watches the way that Wren always implicitly retreats to Annie’s side. She laughs often, their daughter. So, Johanna thinks that has to count for something.

Mags pats her on the hand, gentle touches of her curled finger. Johanna looks at her.

We’re going back in, she thinks. Do you know that?

From the look on Mags’ face, she does. 

Finnick carries Wren back up to the house after she falls asleep, cradling her in his arms. Johanna tromps after him, watches from the doorway. Finnick brushes by her as he leaves, her fingers wandering over her wrist. He looks at her, but she ignores him, because she doesn’t need to hear whatever he’s going to say. He pads away and still Johanna doesn’t move from the doorway. She watches Wren, hands curled near her face, moonlight streaming in her bedroom. There are a few stuffed animals scattered near the edge of her bed. 

Johanna inches forward, aware with every step, that she doesn’t belong here. She sits carefully down on the edge of the bed, doesn’t let herself actually touch Wren. (She thinks about carding her fingers through Wren’s hair, how all these touches come so easily to Annie, even to Finnick. They do these actions without thinking, expressing their love unconditionally.) 

She wonders what kind of mother she would have been if she hadn’t been reaped at the age of seventeen. Probably not a very good one either way. She doesn’t have the patience. She was always too much temper, too much hot blood. She rarely thinks of the might-have-beens. There’s too little time for regret. But ever since Plutarch Heavensbee walked into their lives, such thoughts seem to be seeping into brain. (Oh, she wants to kill Snow. She wants to drive an axe into his belly, into the skull of every Gamemaker who has ever existed. But would it be such a bad thing for her daughter to have a safe childhood because of that?)

She falls asleep and doesn’t wake up until after dawn when she feels Wren tugging at her hair. Johanna smiles without thinking about it, one of the first genuine smiles she’s given in years. She drops her own mask. Gathers Wren up in her arms until she laughs, cups her face as well; Johanna doesn’t let herself think anything.

They go down to breakfast and she can tell by the set of Annie’s shoulders, by the way there’s red rimming her eyes, by the way she stares at Finnick, that Finnick has told her what’s happening. She looks at Johanna in the same way, jaw going too tense. Her hands forget what they’re doing, and she nearly drops the bowl before Finnick steps in to retrieve it. He says something to her, whispered against Annie’s shoulder, and Johanna gives them space, gets Wren settled at the table amongst all of Finnick’s family. 

She feels a hollow space in her chest as she watches all of them interact. It’s where her heart used to be. I understand why Finnick fights for all of you now, she thinks. It’s a treasonous thought that’s been growing inside her for months. It’s the only thing she knows to be true now.

 

There is no love lost between her and her district. Seven does not weep when her name is plucked once again. But they are embittered. They have lost too many sons, too many daughters. The rebellion is simmering here. 

As she gets on the train again, she says good-bye to the trees, to the sensation of steady dirt beneath her feet, to the open sky. She gives the sun a three-fingered funeral salute, says watch over my district. It’s always been the closest thing I’ve had to a home. 

On the train, she watches Finnick being reaped. Watches Mags and Katniss and Peeta. Hears Plutarch say, Anything can happen during a Quarter Quell. 

 

The Quarter Quell shouldn’t be easier. In many ways, it isn’t. But in many ways, it’s routine. She knows everyone else who has been reaped. They’ve all been clustered together during the Games, all seen what the Capitol does to the other. They’ve seen the worst of each other. It’s almost as if it’s all the same parties, all the same jokes — except for the fact that they will be trying to kill each other this time. 

They’ve all sat through Flickerman’s interviews a hundred times over; most of them have serviced him in some way. It’s a shock that Gloss and Cashmere can pretend to talk civilly to the man. They manage tears on stage. The Capitol fawns over them, over One and Two — and yet, it’s not until Finnick goes on stage that they seem to remember exactly what they are losing. Oh, the Capitol will mourn Cashmere, Brutus. But there will always be another Victor from One and Two. 

There will only ever be one Finnick Odair. 

Johanna stands just off stage, feels the plucking and pulling of her stylist’s fingers and couldn’t give a fuck what she’s wearing. (She would go in naked if she could, remind them all that she doesn’t fear them.) 

The crowd is crazed when Finnick walks on stage. The women in the front row begin openly weeping, and Finnick is stalwart, poised, as he remains standing by Caesar. He doesn’t sit, just wears an enigmatic expression as if he has all the secrets in the world. (He does.)

“Finnick,” Caesar says, brimming with excitement. He claps Finnick on the back, and Finnick barely budges. “How are you?”

Finnick merely smiles and Caesar launches into his usual line of questions — how Finnick is preparing, what’s he’s been doing in the Capitol on what might be his final night. Johanna tunes these questions out easily. 

“And did you get a chance to say good-bye to your daughter?”

Johanna zeroes back in, watching the stage out of the corner of her eye. She feels all of the other Victors looking at her as well. This is a powerful card for all of them, and she’s sure that they’re all happy that Finnick gets to play it first. 

Finnick lets the silence drag on, painful moments that bring the audience to its knees. (Do you see what you’ve done, this silence says. You’ve wounded this god you’ve made. You’ve turned him back into nothing more than a mortal, broken his heart entirely.)

“I just hate to leave her alone,” Finnick says finally, looks across the stage. He meets Johanna’s eyes, and she walks out without thinking about it, cutting into Finnick’s interview. Her stylist tries to catch her, but Johanna brushes past her, walks out, chin held high, head tilted to the side. Finnick holds out a hand to her as Caesar sputters. Johanna looks only at Finnick, ignores the way the audience is starting to shout. Finnick looks at her steadily and then thrusts their hands up into the air, holding them aloft.

Johanna is surprised when, seconds later, someone else grips her hand, and there’s Peeta Mellark, the boy from 12 — and the other Victors stream on stage, holding each other tight. Reminding the Capitol what they’re destroying, what they’re giving up. 

The lights cut out on them. 

 

“Now,” Johanna argues fiercely when they meet later, when Haymitch tries to tell them how to befriend Katniss. “We do it now. Fuck going into the arena. We’ve got the Capitol on our side. Fuck the war. Fuck those traitors in 13. Fuck Plutarch’s little show. Let’s take care of Snow now.”

There are some arguments, some hesitations, but even Plutarch bends to their will. He shows them where all the weapons are being kept, precisely designed instruments that have been made for them. Then, really, there’s no stopping them. They have the element of surprise. Most of the president’s guards have limited experience. They have training, but well, tributes know exactly how far experience will get you. Twenty-four angry Victors storm through the Capitol. She and Finnick are both toward the front, clearing a path. She swings her axe savagely, working counterpoint to Finnick. He lunges and she practically smashes skulls with her axe. When they get to the doors, she takes them down with bloodied swings and then kicks them in. 

Suddenly, they’re there. It’s happened in such a blur, and Johanna is soaked to the bone in blood, staring at the man who has led the war against them, against their lives. He doesn’t even have the good grace to look afraid. He simply stares at her the same way he did when she came out of the arena, when he laid out her fate for her. She wonders if he’s doing the same thing in his head now, telling himself exactly how this is all going to play out, and how he can’t let them get any more satisfaction than possible. 

Johanna grits her teeth, tightens her fingers around the handle of her axe and can feel blood squelch in between her fingertips. She’s about to take his head — when she sees something shift out of the corner of her eye. Another soldier, leveling a gun — at Finnick, whose guard is down for once in his idiot life. Johanna moves before thinking about it, tackles Finnick to the ground. They collide. Finnick’s trident clatters to the side, Johanna’s chin hits his shoulder. Above them, the bullet embeds itself into the wall.  
Katniss steps forward. Delivers two arrows in quick succession. One to the guard. One to Snow.

And that’s how it ends. 

 

Johanna leaves the Capitol right away. She stays long enough to make sure that one of Snow’s henchman isn’t going to take over — and that’s not as hard as they would expect, because the man refused to let anybody be groomed to lead. He assumed he would just live forever. 

They make a tentative peace with 13, one that is strained. But it will last for now. 

She gets on a train three days after their coup, axe cleaned and strapped to her back. Victors are a common enough sight in the streets right now. There aren’t reporters flocking to her anymore, but she can feel the way the crowds part in front of her, the way everyone’s eyes slide to wherever she is. She is Johanna Mason, Victor of her Games, a leader of the revolution. 

She still isn’t as popular as Finnick Odair or Katniss Everdeen or Peeta Mellark. Thank fuck. The three of them have been on television constantly. Finnick is charming and Peeta is genuine. Katniss is … enigmatic. Johanna has no idea why the Capitol loves her, but even they swarm to her as overwhelmed as they are. They’d put her on a throne if she would accept it.

The Victors tell the Capitol, tell the districts, tell Panem — We’re going to make a better world.

Johanna is surprised when she goes to step on the train and somebody grabs her arm. She recoils reflexively from the touch, prepares to strike — and turns to see Finnick. He looks a bit flustered, looks as if he maybe ran here. Or maybe he just hasn’t been worked on by his prep team today. He looks more like he does when he’s in Four.

“Jo—” He starts to say. 

“I’ll tell her,” Johanna says, stalwart. She doesn’t want to hear the words tripping off his tongue. And she doesn’t need to now, she supposes. Maybe that would have disturbed her once.

“Jo—” He tries to say again, tone changing, and still she knows: Thank you for saving my life when you could have ended Snow’s. Thank you for missing your shot at revenge just so I could see our daughter again. 

“I’ll see you soon, Finnick,” she says insistently, but he tugs her off the platform of the train into a too-tight hug. What an idiot, she thinks, as she hugs him back. 

 

Annie is waiting at the train station when Johanna arrives in the middle of the night. She is not the only to disembark this time, but she is the last to get off the train, her legs weak beneath her as if she needs to sleep to make up for everything that’s happened lately. 

She hadn’t expected to see Annie, because Finnick is staying in the Capitol just a little longer, ignoring the thrum in his veins that calls him home to Annie. 

Annie rushes at her the moment she’s off the train though, tears streaming down her face. She gathers Johanna up in her arms as if Johanna is the one she’s been waiting her entire life for and holds her tightly. They quake in the train station together, Johanna resting her head on Annie’s shoulder, because she feels like she finally can. 

“Thank you,” Annie keeps saying. “You saved so many lives,” Annie whispers into her hair. It’s the first time anybody has ever said this to her.

Johanna doesn’t say the message that Finnick sent with her out loud, because Annie Cresta already knows everything Finnick Odair feels. Instead, Johanna Mason goes home with Annie, lets Annie unstrap the axe from around her shoulders, and sleeps for a long time.

 

Wren Odair is five years old the first time Johanna takes her to District Seven. It is a week after Annie and Finnick’s wedding (Annie is already pregnant with their son, something they aren’t taking any care to hide. Wren is excited at the prospect of a brother.)

Wren’s tanned from days in the sea, but her eyes are wide as they walk through the forest. Johanna still doesn’t know what to do with her, but shows her how to climb the trees and takes her riding on a horse the third day they are there.

She is still young enough that she doesn’t find anything strange about her upbringing. She doesn’t remember the transition of power. She doesn’t know her parents, all three of them, are Victors. She doesn’t know that people talk about them constantly, watch them constantly. She doesn’t know about the room in the house in District Four where a trident and an axe are locked up, because you just never know what the hell is coming your way, but you better be prepared for it. 

She’ll never know the fear of being reaped. The words, “The Hunger Games,” don’t mean anything to her.

Johanna and Wren sleep outside on a warm summer night and Wren falls asleep while Johanna tells her the stories of constellations. Johanna feels the world slowly move around them, feels it hold them close.


End file.
